Even when I was in the act of rolling up the book of Isaiah, very late at night, it occurred to me that the question “Is there a life after death?” might be connected with another, “Is there to be hereafter a reign of righteousness?” I tried to give my mind rest by thinking of other things; but this second question came back to me again and again both before and after I retired to rest. Epictetus spoke about “the sceptre and throne of Diogenes”: but I knew he would not assert that the philosopher’s “sceptre” implied any present kingdom except over his own mind and the minds of a small band of Cynics—small in comparison with Stoics and Epicureans, and nothing at all in comparison with the non-philosophic myriads. As for a kingdom of righteousness after death in another world, I was now certain that Epictetus did not expect it; and I began to doubt whether he expected such a kingdom at any time in this world. If to believe in Providence means to believe in a God who foresees and prepares that which is best—I could not understand where Epictetus could find a basis for such a belief.

With the Jews, it was otherwise. They, I could see, had received a special training, which made them, more than any other nation known to me, begin by expecting a reign of righteousness on earth. Beginning thus, and being largely disappointed, they might be led on to expect a reign of righteousness in heaven. Their history was like a collection of stories for children, teeming with what a child might call[110] surprises, but a prophet judgments—evil, uppermost, suddenly cast down; humble patient goodness, chastened by pains and trials, lifted up to lordship over its past oppressors. Examples occurred to me before I slept, and many more during the night, in my waking moments. I had not noticed them so clearly when reading the Law consecutively. Now, grouped together, they came almost as a new revelation—if not of history, at all events of legend, and of a nation’s thoughts, and of the training through which the Jew Paul must have passed in his childhood and youth.

First, there was Abraham—Abraham the homeless, going out from unbelievers to worship the one God, and receiving a promise that he should be the father of blessing, for multitudes in all the nations of the earth; Abraham the childless, rewarded with the child of promise; Abraham the kind and yielding, who gave way to his kinsman Lot, so that the older patriarch was content with the inferior pastures while the younger chose the fertile lands of Sodom and Gomorrah; Abraham the father of the one child that embodied the truth of the one God, offering up that child on the altar, and receiving him back as if from Hades; Abraham the landless, without a foot of ground in the land promised to him, buying with money a cave to bury his family. “Surely,” I said, “the story of Abraham, in itself, is a compendium of national history not indeed for Rome, but for a nation of peace (if only the nation could live up to it!) most fit for training a child to become a citizen in the City of Righteousness!”

If the life of Abraham was full of surprises or paradoxes, so too were the lives of the other patriarchs and leaders of the nation. Isaac, “laughter,” laid himself down to die in appearance, but to “laugh” at death in reality. Esau was the “elder,” yet he was to “serve the younger.” Jacob was promised lordship over his brother in the future, but he bowed down before him in the present. The same patriarch, a poor man, with nothing but his “staff,” became rich and prosperous. Yet, because he had deceived his father, he in turn was deceived by his children and sorely tried by their contentions. Through Samuel, the little child, God rebuked Eli the high priest; and[111] the little one became the prophet and judge of Israel. David, the despised and youngest of many brethren, became the greatest of Israel’s kings.

Such was the history of the great men of the ancient Jews—tried, but triumphing over trial. On the other hand, the history of the mass of the common people, from the time when they were a family of twelve sons, shewed them as going astray, lying, quarrelling and rebelling. For this they were punished by plagues and enemies; then, delivered by judges or prophets; but only, as it seemed, again to fall away, and to be delivered again; so that the reader of the histories, apart from the prophecies, might well suppose that these ebbs and flows were to go on for ever; that Israel was to be always imperfect, always liable to rebellion; and that the promise to Abraham was never to be fulfilled. More especially might a reader of the histories anticipate this when he saw the great empires of the east, Assyria and Babylon, leading the tribes away into captivity and destroying Jerusalem and the Temple.

Such were my thoughts by night concerning the Law and the Histories of Israel. Resuming the study of the prophecy early next morning, I perceived that in the sins and backslidings of the people there was yet another and far deeper illustration of what might be called “the law of paradoxes.” Not only came prosperity out of adversity but also righteousness out of sin, and out of punishment promise. Some of Isaiah’s most comforting prophecies arose from the invasion of Israel by Assyria. In this connexion there came a promise about a “child” that was to be “born,” of whom it was said “the government shall be upon his shoulder.” These things reminded me of passages in the poems, where the poet—musing on the chastisements and deliverances that followed the sins of Israel—exclaims “His mercy endureth for ever,” or “I remember the days of old, I meditate on all thy doings.” In the history of Greece and Rome I could find comparatively few stories of such “doings.” How indeed could I reasonably expect them? Romans and Greeks worship many Gods, but only one Father of Gods and men. Athens might claim Athene, and other cities might have their special patrons among the Gods. But how[112] could it be supposed that the Father of Gods and men would make any one nation His peculiar care? Virgil says that Venus was on the side of the future Rome, and that Jupiter favoured Venus; but Juno intervenes for Carthage. Then Jupiter has to compromise between Juno and Venus, or to conciliate Juno by laying the blame on fate! “How different,” I exclaimed, “all this is from the Hebrew egotism that represents the one God as continually saying to Israel ‘Thee have I chosen’!”

Yet I had hardly uttered the word “egotism” before I felt inclined to qualify it, adding, “But it is not ‘egotism’ from Paul’s point of view.” For indeed Paul seemed to think that God chose Abraham, not for Abraham’s own sake—or at all events not merely for Abraham’s own sake—but for the sake of “all the nations of the earth,” to bring light and truth to them. Epictetus spoke of Diogenes as “bearing on himself the orb of the world’s vast cares.” Somewhat similarly—when I took up the Law of the Jews to revise the thoughts that had come to me in the night—I found the Law describing the life of Abraham the friend of God. For I did not find Abraham blessed or happy—as the world would use the terms “blessing” and “happiness.”

Abraham begins as a homeless wanderer, going forth from his kindred at the bidding of the one true God; and a homeless wanderer he remains to the end. He is a father of kings but no king himself, not even a landowner! He has to buy with money land enough to bury his dead! His life is one of intercession as well as concession. Abraham intercedes for the dwellers in Sodom and Gomorrah, feeling it a painful thing that even a few righteous should suffer with the many. Once indeed Abraham becomes a soldier. But it is not for himself. It is for his kinsman and for the rescue of captives. Abraham makes himself a servant, waiting at table upon his guests. Abraham offers to God the life of his only son. If Paul was right, and if the children of Abraham mean the men that do such things as these in such a spirit as this, and if “the seed of Abraham” is the man that incarnates this spirit, then, ............